Artificial advocates need to get real

Something tells me we still have a way to go if we're going to provide folks with a real artificial Christmas. The thought occurred to me while watching a TV commercial for a company that makes artificial trees.

For $19, the maker will send you a box of branches so you can judge for yourself how lifelike it is. I hate to be a party pooper, but I recall when you could buy a whole tree — and a real one — for no more than that. But no matter. For a good fake, obviously you have to be willing to shell out.

But trees, important as they may be, are only part of the holiday tradition. We'll never have a genuine artificial Christmas experience as long as we persist in exchanging real gifts. Why real ones? Isn't it time we started surrounding our artificial trees with artificial gifts?

Gift certificates would qualify as artificial, and perhaps become even more popular than they already are. Catalog photos of real presents too, topped with red and green bows, or gaily-wrapped boxes containing nothing but plain ozone like those cans of Maine air they sell to tourists — now there's something to look forward to under the phony mistletoe.

The nice thing about such artificial gifts is that you wouldn't have to spend the days after the holiday schlepping them back to the stores because they were the wrong size or color. And nobody would need to feel guilty for not sending artificial letters of thanks to the givers of their artificial gifts. Hardly anybody sends thank-you notes anymore anyway, artificial or otherwise.

You could also buy one of those artificial fireplaces for the holidays that simulates real flames, and crank it up for a real festive touch to your Yuletide. Not to mention listening to the artificiality of recordings by Alvin and the Chipmunks performing your favorite old-time carols.

We already have an artificial symbol to provide the face of Christmas — the much overworked and omnipresent Santa Claus. You'll see and hear him "ho-ho-hoing" his artificial jollity all over the place in the days immediately ahead. By the time he makes his exit on Dec. 26, his approval ratings may be even lower than President Obama's, unless, of course, the latter finds some artificial way to reverse the trend.

One year, in Maine, where artificial firs are not as easy to come by, we made do with a real tree, fresh out of the ground. It wasn't the prettiest tree in the pasture, but my brother-in-law, Leroy, brought along his chainsaw and shaped it into a really lifelike Tannenbaum. He drilled holes in just the right places and inserted branches where nature had failed to provide them. I guess you could have called his finished product a hybrid.

(Leroy also shot a 909-pound bull moose last month, but that's another story. Suffice to say, he didn't use an artificial shotgun.)

Speaking of nature and trees, Al Southwick, a fellow columnist for this publication, whose family owned a large Christmas tree farm, used to tell about the time an out-of-state motorist helped himself to one. A family member spotted the theft in the making and hastened to confront the hatchet-wielder. "Hey, what are you doing?" he demanded. "I'm chopping down this Christmas tree" was the reply. "But that's my tree," The baffled bandit wasn't buying. "Nobody owns a tree," he insisted, "they all belong to God." For which the grower had this retort: "I'm sorry, he doesn't pay the taxes on this land, I do."